The Latest Colour-Changing Smart Bulb Turns Life Into a Rave

Even the light bulb, one of the earliest electrical inventions, can afford to have tweaks made. With this Kickstarter bulb, use your smartphone to switch the light’s colour: anything from shades of white to Night at the Roxbury-invoking fuchsia. Imagine Hue that comes fully featured out of the box.

We’ve written a lot about smartphone-controlled bulbs, which are the opposite of those soul-sucking incandescent lights in cubicles across the world. Hue, Philips’ own chameleon-like wonder bulb, came out way back in 2012, and there’s been a ton since. Basically, bulbs like these take the idea of “mood lighting” and runs with it.

How is this one, called Ilumi, different? First, it’s wicked bright—brighter than Hue’s 600 lumens. Ilumi’s got two versions: the standard, 10-watt/800-lumen model, and the 14-watt/1150 lumen flood light.

Ilumi’s also got some neat little features, like turning on and off with a shake of your smartphone. And it looks like you can control everything from its upcoming, slick app: pick individual colours for multiple rooms at once, or have the app suggest colours based on “moods,” like “dinner with friends.” Or if you want to get funky, using the Spotify integration to adjust the light to the music you’re listening to. Suddenly, your living room is a disco.

We’re not sure how often you’d want the lighting in your house to make the full ROYGBIV cycle, but like its competitors, Ilumi promises other Smart Home uses, too. For example, it’ll sense the presence of your phone, turning on and off as you get closer so that you don’t have press a switch. Or, Ilumi can set the light to turn on and off randomly while you’re on vacation for extra safety. And it’s energy efficient, claiming 20 years of light.

It looks like Hue has more features, like using a photo from your library to set the colour pallet the light bulb chooses from. Ilumi’s funding goal is $50K, and it’s at $252K right now. Usual Kickstarter caveats apply: Buy at your own risk.